Free Will And Ego

Beach Reading Continues
My Ego Becomes What I Would Be If I Could Be Myself
Keaau Beach, Hawaii

Two consequences follow from the for-itself (Sartre’s being for-itself) 1)
consciousness and belief have overlapping meanings and exist together
within knowledge; and, 2) negation and freedom form an inseparable unity.

It is impossible to separate belief from consciousness and still have
cognitive awareness. Perception, according to Sartre, is not
isolated into either consciousness or belief. These seemingly separate
mental epochs occur simultaneously. Consciousness is necessary for
belief, and belief is the "being of consciousness." My thoughts occur
and I apprehend them as occurring. In Sartre's terminology, this is my
consciousness of reflection-reflecting and/or my consciousness of
presence-to-self. Knowledge, in this sense, becomes present not only
to the for-itself, it also becomes the continuing articulation of
being-for-itself's relationship with being-in-itself. Outside of
knowledge, there is nothing—no ego. (I'll talk about that in a moment.)

Knowledge is found everywhere except in the for-itself. Worldliness,
spatiality, quantity, temporality, instrumentality, etc. arise in
consciousness as objects for the for-itself, but the for-itself can
never become a conscious object—just like a knife blade cannot cut
itself. My world is revealed through these qualifications and, in
turn, these qualifications dictate my knowledge of the world. Were it
not for the inherent nothingness of the for-itself, there would not be
a consciousness of knowledge.

Sartre has described the for-itself as the "pure reflection of non
being," and it is this negation of being which let's knowledge come
into the world. In this respect, the knower-known dichotomy is reduced
to mere fabrication, since the knower does not exist. Knowledge
occupies our consciousness as our experience—the experience of the
for-itself--encounters knowledge. The requisite condition for
knowledge is the nothingness of the for-itself. This nothingness makes
human reality possible while it remains just outside the reach of this reality.

Sartre also tells us that the ever-elusive present is a further
consequence of this negation. Our location in time, to put it mildly,
is not very precise. I am conscious of being conscious of something
other than myself, and that something is my past self. What I grasp in
self-consciousness is my past self—the self that has become
being-in-itself. But, being-in-itself is being, so it follows that
consciousness is always conscious of being. On the other hand,
consciousness—being-for-itself—is never an object of consciousness. I
have a body and I have a history; these are my objects of
consciousness. I am never, however, conscious of the for-itself's
negation-- its lack, hole, nothingness, (it makes no difference how
you say it, all are equivalent) because this negativity, for Sartre,
is the pre-condition for consciousness To Be Conscious. It is, in
fact, this pre-condition, this non-being of consciousness, which
becomes the basis for free will.

The act by which being-for-itself separates itself from its past (the
separation of being-for-itself from being-in-itself) constitutes my
freedom. This separation cuts me off from my past, but it also plops
me down in the center of freedom--a freedom that demands that I
either sink or swim. Sartre says, "existence precedes essence"—there
is no tie-up of my present with my past. I need not be determined by
my past. I am separated from it by my own nothingness. Therefore, I am
free to freely choose my future until death intervenes.

Under the weight of my own freedom, I am still able to maintain a
sense of personal identity. Sartre denies the ego as an inhabitant of
consciousness, although he grants consciousness its own personal
consciousness. Insofar as I am able to experience consciousness as
presence-to-itself, I also experience my own personal consciousness.
The annihilating act, which produces presence-to-itself, involves ego.
This ego is given to consciousness from outside of consciousness as
"the reason for consciousness." My ego becomes what I would be, if I
could be myself. It becomes one of my possibilities. It is a
transcendent possibility, though. It is not found in consciousness. It
becomes a "made to order" ego. It becomes the reason for consciousness
at the time I am conscious of consciousness. All truths, values,
psychic objects—everything that constitutes ego—get introduced to
consciousness from the world outside of consciousness, as objects for
consciousness. The ego is not the owner of consciousness;
consciousness is the owner of ego. The for-itself can never be
conscious of itself, but it is conscious (can be conscious) of a lack
of self. The "inner ego of consciousness," for Sartre, is bound up
with this nothingness and is called "being-for-itself."

To recap: Self-consciousness, or my relationship to consciousness,
brings to consciousness the pure negative of my own nothingness.
Self-consciousness denies itself a coincidence with itself. It denies
itself a coincidence with the objects of consciousness--the
consciousness-belief dyad. It is in consciousness, however, as
presence-to-itself, but it denies itself the possibility of ever
becoming fully aware of itself. Self-consciousness is its own
negativity. Thus, I am conscious of it as what I am not, as what I
lack, as a "hole" in my consciousness, as a "hole" in my very being.